How to use it
- Send your client one link. The Business Idea Check for their own idea; Business Types if they know the kind of business (49 types, with the cost categories already listed); Evaluate a franchise if they’re weighing a franchise.
- They fill it in, in one sitting. Costs per sale, monthly and startup costs, what they need to take home, their hours, competitor prices and any evidence of demand. Several products and services, each charged its own way, are supported.
- They bring the one-page summary — or the plan file they saved, which you can open together on any computer.
What’s on the one-page summary
- A plain-English decision: move forward, close specific gaps first, test demand first, or rethink the model — with the reasons.
- Key numbers: price (or every offer’s price), sales needed to pay the owner, take-home, startup and running costs, and the cash needed to get through the ramp-up.
- Three prices worked out from costs: one that covers costs, one that also pays the owner, and a recommended price with a cushion.
- Year one month by month, summarised, and a stress test with sales 25% lower and costs 10% higher.
- What has to be true for the plan to work, checkpoints for the first 90 days, and points to discuss.
It’s a feasibility check on the numbers, not a business plan — a good starting point for one, or for a loan conversation.
Message you can send a client
Before we meet, please work through the free Business Idea Check at goprooffice.com/idea-check. It asks what your business will cost and shows what to charge, the sales you need to pay yourself and the cash it takes to start. Guesses are fine — mark them as guesses. At the end, choose "Print one-page summary" and bring it to our session. Nothing you enter is sent anywhere unless you choose to.
Privacy and neutrality
- Free, with no account needed. What a client enters stays on their own device — kept in their browser so they can come back to it — and is never sent to us.
- GoProOffice is run by GHL Financial Services. The only way a plan reaches GHL is if the client chooses “Send my plan to GHL” at the end. You’re never asked to refer anyone.
- No ads inside the tools, no franchise rankings or referral fees, and no sale of data.
- Benchmarks are sourced: Census Nonemployer Statistics on the business-type pages, and named studies for franchise fees. Where no reliable figure exists, the tool says so instead of guessing.
- Educational only — not tax, legal or financial advice. The report points clients to free mentoring from SCORE and SBDCs.